The Vermont Legislature is now on its Town Meeting week break. It is an opportunity for us to go to town/information meetings, meet with constituents, and re-energize our personal batteries. My hope is to get to 12 town/information meetings this […]
Category: State News
Heating up
With self-imposed deadlines coming up to move legislation from the House to the Senate or vice versa, the pace of bills advancing is heating up. And being the second year of the biennium with elections coming up this fall, the […]
Dec. 18-19 disaster declaration approved for seven counties
Rutland and Windsor are among them President Joseph Biden has signed a major public assistance disaster declaration for seven Vermont counties to assist communities in recovering costs for the repair of public infrastructure damaged by severe storms and flooding on […]
Gardeners/farmers take note: USDA hardiness zones have changed
By Deborah J. Benoit, UVM extension master gardener There are countless things that can go right or wrong in a garden. Some of them are obvious: too much or too little water, diseases, pests and critters that nibble on […]
Nikki Haley wins Vermont, the first state to spurn Trump in primaries
By Glenn Russell/VTDigger Above: Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley spoke in South Burlington on March 3. By Emma Cotton and Paul Heintz/VTDigger Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley won her first state in the Republican presidential primary on Tuesday […]
Education spending ticks down as state gets affirmation of what’s driving costs
By Ethan Weinstein/VTDigger Submitted The latest data from the shows a small decrease in projected education spending and affirms previously anecdotal evidence on the major factors causing a projected increase in education property taxes. Health care costs, construction, special […]
Select Board candidate questions personal property tax as an on-your-honor town-by-town revenue source
By Curt Peterson When Select Board candidate Andrew Gieda confronted current board members about Killington’s personal property tax at a recent public meeting, it garnered attention. Gieda claimed a large percentage of eligible Killington businesses were not filing their “personal […]
Difficult choices
It was widely known that putting together the next state budget was going to be tight. All the extra federal money that came to Vermont during the pandemic, has previously been appropriated and state revenue growth has slowed. The […]
Governor Scott signs education financing bill H.850
Warns Legislature: more work is needed to control costs Governor Phil Scott signed H.850, an act relating to transitioning education financing to the new system for pupil weighting, on Thursday, Feb. 22. The new law seeks to reduce property tax increases this year, […]
A reality check
During House discussion of H.850 last week, which removes the controversial 5% cap on the equalized homestead rates for education, the chair of the House Ways & Means Committee repeated the obvious: Spending increases generally cause tax increases. And that […]